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The optics (at the moment) seem to be the most important issue here. Whether or not the vote is legitimate is quite irrelevant in immediate aftermath. This is a
by Y7ZCQtNo39 9y ago
The optics (at the moment) seem to be the most important issue here. Whether or not the vote is legitimate is quite irrelevant in immediate aftermath. This is a government using physical force against its citizens for, of all things, voting -- a core democratic principle.
Democracy must be tolerant of peaceful protesting. An "illegal" vote (depending who's lens we are viewing this from), to me, is a form of peaceful protest. Candor, mutual respect, and peaceful organizing are some of a few tools democracies have to solve problems without devolving to unrest and violence. If we assume we highly value avoiding violence (and we should), governments need to tolerate the use of these tools, from time to time.
By banning the use of these more moderate options, the national government is essentially promoting dissenters to even less desirable options so they have at least some form of expression. I think we should be surprised the national government chose to use such force when it had far less invasive means for dealing with the consequences of this vote, e.g., courts.
- bassman9000 9y agoIt was an illegal act, funded by public money. Had the government not acted, it would have set a bad precedent: that constitution doesn't hold weight in real life.
- Y7ZCQtNo39 9y agoMaybe a court should be deciding whether or not it is illegal, not the police. Again, my comment was about using the proper response to a given situation. I don't think the use of public money for the illegal act necessarily sets a bad precedent. The constitution didn't say to go out there and spray rubber bullets at civilians. So how a government can respond to this illegal act is a subjective choice. Spain could have chosen to use less authoritarian methods to deal with the consequences of this ballot without setting any precedents. It could have been declared unenforceable by a court, which is a more appropriate venue.
- kgwgk 9y agoPolice was instructed by courts to prevent the (illegal) vote from taking place.
- RandVal30142 9y agoI dare beating firemen for voting is more illegal than holding a vote itself, let alone attending/partaking in it. The use of violence by the state forfeits such claims and opens up an avenue for reciprocation by others, which is a terrible thing to enable all due to a vote. >that constitution doesn't hold weight in real life We will see what carries more weight, violence or paper.
- pako_crack 9y agoBeware of fake news here too. That picture of firemen fighting back is from years ago, when they were protesting against local police (Catalan one).
- RandVal30142 9y agoOh. Seems I completely failed my part at reversing the images I browsed. That is my bad.
- justin66 9y ago> Had the government not acted, it would have set a bad precedent: that constitution doesn't hold weight in real life. Nobody expected them not to react to the referendum. Using cops with clubs instead of lawyers was disappointing.
- hjrnunes 9y agoIt wasn't the government. Spain has separation of powers. The courts declared the action illegal and directed the police to end it. The organisers knew of the court's decision and still went ahead. That is reckless. If they wanted to protest they could've organised demonstrations and protests - which are perfectly allowed in Spain.
- Y7ZCQtNo39 9y agoIt seems like the federal government had an issue with the local government. Your average citizen wasn't responsible for coordinating the voting effort -- those were public dollars. So why were the citizens held responsible for the local government's behavior? If the Spanish government was going to use physical force, it wasn't the Catalan citizen's fault for showing up to the polls -- it was the Catalan government.